It’s unlikely anybody outside of Mazda and Ford know the level of detail in the agreement between Hiroshima’s hero and the Detroit giant when it came to conceiving the Ranger/BT-50 monozygotic twin.
It’s curious because Ranger starting at $28K going all the way to $80K and the BT sneaking in at $21K and only asking $50K for its flashiest XTR 4×4 dual-cab specification, it seems moronic to consider a Ranger.Ever.
Think about the marketing, and again back to that Ford-Mazda alliance as to how they would proposition the two utes to consumers.
Is BT-50 the more affordable one, pitched at fleets, and smaller lower budgets? Does that mean the Ranger is the more affluent ute, with all the safety gear and a superior wrap sheet?
But looking at the reported sales figures, with Ranger consistently posting number twos into the VFACTS stats, it looks like the Blue Oval is the thriftier buy.
Over 170,000 reported business, government and rental light commercial sales in 2018 dominated the measly 63,000 or so private sales could show a correlation with how Ford Australia sold roughly 42,000 single and dual-cab variants, against Mazda’s 13,000 BT-50s.
Having said all this and loaned two BT-50s courtesy of Mazda Australia for two consecutive weeks, it seems absurd to overlook Hiroshima for Detroit.Seriously, just try explaining it using rational arguments.
Using the first BT-50 as not quite a daily driver in the first week involved a barely-noticeable towing task bringing a dozen concrete sleepers and their corresponding steel posts – plus many bags of concrete – home from Bunnings late on a week night confirmed that yes, utes are much comfier laden.It also piqued the aforementioned curiosity for Ranger among non-private and private buyers.
Sitting in the backseat firing down to Phillip Island for a beach day, with rows and rows of traffic coming home the opposite direction, Rangers are everywhere.Towing girthy tri-axle caravans, others with L-plates on the back, some in single-cab with a company logo on the door.Yet only one BT-50 can be seen in the same journey.
And people wonder why they can’t afford to keep the jetski, or have to re-mortgage, or are forced to shop at Aldi – not that there’s anything wrong with that – but it signals people are buying based on something other than cost.Irrationally, perhaps.
The updated BT-50 tested here gets a new Alpine head unit with Andriod Auto and Apple Carplay, a properly-adjusted reversing camera as standard (and perfectly placed for hitching a trailer).
It also gets a new front end designed by Mazda Australia and its canopy design partner EGR in Queensland, but that’s about where the glaring updates can be seen without going to the brochure.
Off-roaders will appreciate a battery mounted forward in the engine bay, making access to use an air compressor easy.
Frustrating for the sub-180cm tall buyer is a lack of reach adjustment in the steering, but that’s not to say you won’t find a suitable driving position.On a two-hour dash up to Bendigo, the BT-50 is reasonably comfortable for a workhorse, whether for fleet use or private.
Isn’t it also curious why people would swear by their Ranger, yet the XTR 4×4 BT-50 at 1082kg has a greater payload than an auto XLT 4×4 Ranger on 970kg or the XLS with 991kg.And whoop-di-doo, the Mazda also has 3.5t towing and 3.2t GVM.
Under the bonnet is the 3.2-litre five-pot diesel we know from Ranger, plus lots of miscellaneous parts around the engine bay, which still bear the FoMoCo insignia.
Rarely needing to draw on all 147kW before 3000rpm, the BT-50 pulls pretty effortlessly and offers the same 470Nm which is all the torque most ute buyers could ever need or use.It’s enough to make the family camper feel inflatable.
Two weeks with a BT-50 isn’t testament enough to the longevity it offers the savvy consumer, but the fact my cousin has had one of the current generation for years is.
He’s taken the BT through the inland east coast, as far north as Cairns, usually with two dogs and a caravan in tow, and for a CFA firefighter who relies on his truck – sorry, ute – to get him there and back without fail, it’s puzzling why more people go for the “prettier” Ranger.Although personally, the latter is hardly easy on the eye.
They may be cut from the same cloth, but the BT-50 and Ranger definitely have two distinctly different personalities.One is one of the most popular vehicles in the country, the other performs all the same load-lugging, rock-wrangling tough stuff you could throw at it.
Can you just imagine how capable the next BT-50 will be when the partnership with Isuzu Ute bears fruit?
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